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Stoopid Hood

Coolant hose came off the 540 water pump on the way home tonight. Stopped at a nearby Walgreens and put the hose back on, bought 2 gal. of premix antifreeze, topped up the coolant, and headed for home to bleed the system and fill it up properly. Temp got to red then dropped (heater on full blast) so no biggie. Went to pop the hood - nothing. Suckage meter starts to peg. Found a post on another forum that was invaluable - here's the trick - To release the hood when the cable breaks, pull the driver's side kidney grill, look around up under the hood with a mirror toward the driver's side (left side of the car) until you see a little bracket that has 2 cables hooked to it. Use a pick or whatever and push that bracket (kinda hard) toward the driver's side, the hood will release. There are 3 cables in the hood release system, I will replace all of them, found a place that sells them as a kit. So if you ever need to open a stuck hood, I hope this helps.

Re: Stoopid Hood

Marty,

Thanks for the kit link. I am going to get one, as my 528i is 15 yrs old now, and sometimes that hood acts like it doesn't want to open. Better to service it on my terms than getting caught somewhere and the sucker quits on me.

Before you break the grill try this (m)

Remove the lower engine cover and reach up above the drivers side headlight. If the hood cable that runs between the two hood locks isn't broken as well as the one above the headlight you can pull on it and pop the hood. Easier to do on a V8, lots of room that the I6 doesn't have in this location.

Re: Before you break the grill try this (m)

I always thought that it was kind of neat that my '92 Porsche included an emergency hood release which was hooked behind one of the fog lights. Remove the fog light, unclip and pull. We got emergency trunk and fuel door releases but I guess we didn't get the hood treatment.

Fuel door release is inside the trunk (m)

Don't know when it started, my 2000 has it, it's the green pull tab next to all the fuses on the right side.
I don't have the trunk release, that started in ~'01 I think. It's only a release to open the trunk if you get locked inside it.

Re: Before you break the grill try this (m)

Actually got the grill out with no problem, had the hood open in about 2 minutes. Pretty easy when you find the bracket to push on. Now I'm waiting for the cable kit to get here so I can make sure this never happens again. Hood release is one of those things you never think about, it sure is the pits when it doesn't work though.